A Guide to Mythology

by Helen A. Clarke

STORY OF THE AINO WHO FELL ASLEEP AT THE FOOT OF A PINE TREE

(Japanese)

There was once a young Aino who fell asleep at the foot of a pine of extraordinary height. While asleep there appeared to him in a dream the goddess of the tree. This pine was near the entrance of an immense cavern at the far end of which is a gleam of light, where there is an issue to another world. He found this cavern by pursuing a bear, who turned out to be a god, up a mountain of the underworld, until it took refuge in a hole in the ground which led into the cavern. When he awoke, he offered up thanks to the tree and set up divine symbols in its honor.